


Apparent Magnitude

by bemusedlybespectacled (ardentintoxication)



Category: Hunger Games Series - All Media Types
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Angst, Arguing, Babies, F/M, Family, Hayffie, Hurt/Comfort, Insecurity, Marriage, Post-Mockingjay, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-21
Updated: 2012-04-21
Packaged: 2017-11-04 01:19:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/388072
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ardentintoxication/pseuds/bemusedlybespectacled
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><em>He asks her to marry him two years after the Rebellion.</em> Haymitch and Effie get married, have babies, and try to live again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Apparent Magnitude

**Author's Note:**

  * For [avengerthemockingjay](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=avengerthemockingjay).



He asks her to marry him two years after the Rebellion. He has a ring already, one that has a diamond with a pearl on either side - “So you can tell the difference,” he says - that he bought in a shop in what remains of District 1.

She says yes.

* * *

Their wedding is a mix of Capitol and District. The wedding proper is organized by Effie, because she really does love pretty things. But the dances are District 12 dances, and when they send their guests home and go upstairs to their bedroom, they toast their piece of bread together.

Afterwards, they touch each other as if it were the first time. He has a large scar across his stomach, and she has a deep burn on the small of her back, and they find them with hands that are shaking. Their hands memorize the feel of each other’s skin.

* * *

Sometimes they argue. She knows she can’t go back - her family’s dead and the Capitol doesn’t exist anymore, not as she knows it - but that is hard to remember when there isn’t central heating and the floors aren’t scrubbed by Avoxes and the geese bite when she feeds them. He knows she means well and it’s not her fault that she doesn’t know how to cook anything or how to work the laundry machine or how to do anything really except smile and look pretty. But that is forgotten when she’s calling him a low-bred backwoods uncivilized District barbarian and he’s telling her that she’s useless and stupid and a spoiled Capitol bitch.

Sometimes he storms out of the house with with a bottle in his hand because  _it’s **hard** , Effie, it’s  **hard**  to let go of a crutch when the reminder of everything I hate is standing right there!_ He’s rightly ashamed for that particular barb, and he stews in his own self-loathing until he hears the door open and her footsteps on the grass.

She puts her hand on his shoulder. “I’m sorry.”

“No, I am, that was- that was unfair.”

“Oh, dear-“

“Sweetheart-“

They’re alright.

* * *

She wants so badly to have children, to dress up and play with and love, and he’s terrified. He still drinks, though not as much, and he still has nightmares where he wakes up screaming and reaching for the knife he used to keep under his pillow. He’s terrible with feelings and he hates kids. They remind him too much of the arena.

But if they put it off any more, she’ll be too old, he knows, and he doesn’t want her to be disappointed.

He goes to talk to Katniss, bottle in hand, after Effie starts to show.

“What am I even doing?” he asks, the mentor asking to be mentored, for once. He pours her another drink.

Katniss snorts, takes it, drinks. “I dunno. I’m not exactly the person to ask. Look at us. I’m twenty-four and I haven’t had kids yet. You’re… what are you?”

“Older than you.”

“Not helpful.”

“I don’t care.”

Katniss makes a face. “That’s my point.” She pours herself another shot, thinking. “If my mom were here,” she says, after a pause, “she’d say that the fact that you worry means you’ll be a good dad.” She glowers. “Not that she’d know.”

“Not helpful.”

“I don’t care.”

They both give wry laughs and take another shot.

Effie keeps growing until her water breaks.

He has a panic attack, sometime in those hours of labor. He hears her screams and he can’t convince himself that she’s not dying, because damnit, she  _sounds_  like she is and she’s in pain and he can’t help her and  _it’s his fault_. He isn’t strong enough for this.

Holding his baby girl in his arms, though, makes him feel like he can be.

“What should we name her?” Effie asks him, pulling out their list of names.

“I like Avis.”

* * *

They have twins two years after that. Effie isn’t the best mother, nor is he he best father, but they try. It seems like all he does is try: try to stop drinking, try to stop swearing, try to stop panicking if the kids play in the woods and stop scaring them if they wake him up while he’s sleeping. Effie falls into the role of mother with her usual energy, and she dresses them up and braids Avis’ hair and tells Paulina and Rufus to  _stop climbing on the furniture, I taught you better manners than this, you’re behaving like wild goslings_.

Peeta visits as much as possible, to bring little frosted cupcakes or a tin of cookies or to watch them and play with them for a few hours so that Haymitch and Effie can rest. He loves the kids, and they love him, and Haymitch says that if he likes them so much then he can either take these ones permanently or get his own damn kids. That hurts, he can tell, but Peeta doesn’t hold a grudge. He’s too good for Katniss, really, but then, Peeta’s too good for everyone.

Katniss gets pregnant three years later.

* * *

Sometimes Peeta takes them out - to see the new baby, to play in the woods - and Haymitch and Effie have time to themselves. She frets over her stretch marks and wrinkles and scars, but they still skate their hands over each other and hold on as if they could be taken apart at any moment, because it feels that way sometimes. He tells her that she’s beautiful and smart under all her makeup and Capitol conditioning and she tells him he’s handsome and brave under all his stubble and gruff behavior.

Sometimes they don’t do anything but hold each other.

* * *

It is fucking weird when Rufus declares his undying love for Katniss’ daughter despite a six year age gap between them. Haymitch is seventy-two and too damn old for this crap and gives his blessing with only a few snarky remarks. Effie is serene and planning things already.

They’re alright.

**Author's Note:**

> Apparent magnitude is the brightness of stars as viewed from the earth, as opposed to absolute magnitude, which is how bright the stars actually are.
> 
> Someone requested that I write about marriage and babies and somehow I turned it into another angsty drabble stack with PTSD and alcoholism. Oops.
> 
> Regarding the timeline:
> 
> This is post-Mockingjay, and we know that the Quarter Quell is one year after Katniss and Peeta's Games. We know that Katniss and Peeta have their first kid fifteen years after the Rebellion. We also know that Haymitch is forty during Katniss and Peeta's Games and forty-one during their Quarter Quell. And we know that Katniss thinks that Effie is about thirty. The rest of it is a lot of me attempting to do math. 
> 
> Basically, my timeline is that Haymitch is forty-four when he marries Effie, forty-seven when Avis is born, forty-nine when the twins are born, fifty-five when Katniss' daughter is born, and seventy-two when Rufus is twenty-three and marries Katniss' sixteen-year-old daughter. Yes, I realize it's squicky, and Haymitch snarks constantly about it and how they shouldn't feel the need to get married before he dies. :P


End file.
